LOUIS Freedman, owner-breeder of Reference Point, who was one of
the best champions of the 1980s, has died at the age of 81.

Since the mid-1960s, Freedman has been one of Britain's most
successful owner-breeders. Among his other prominent winners were I Say,
Lucyrowe, Attica Meli and Oaks heroine Polygamy. Away from racing, in
1977 he was made a CBE for his services to race relations.

Freedman's involvement in racing dates back to the early 1960s
and his career as an estate agent, in which field he became chairman of
his Land Securities Investment Trust. It also led him into contact with
the solicitor Isidore Kerman, who at the time had horses in training
with Walter Nightingall and later was the owner of Plumpton and Fontwell
racecourses.

The Freedman-Kerman partnership bought a yearling filly at
Deauville. The filly, named Fairsica, went into training with
Nightingall, for whom she won a Sandown maiden at three.

Within two years of that victory, Freedman had his first taste of
high- level success when his colt I Say won the White Rose Stakes at
Ascot and finished third behind Sea-Bird in the 1965 Derby.

I Say disappointed after the Derby, but the decision to keep him in
training as a four-year-old was rewarded with victory in the Coronation
Cup and third place in the Hardwicke Stakes. He had his chance at stud
and, before his export to Brazil, sired 1979 Grand National hero
Rubstic.

At the end of 1966, Freedman bought Cliveden Stud in
Buckinghamshire from the Astor family and started to build up his own
breeding operation, which was to reach its zenith with Reference Point.

In 1967, he gave 9,000gns and 1,550gns for two yearling fillies who
became high-class performers-Lucyrowe and Seventh Bride.

Nightingall died in the summer of 1968 and his sister Margery, who
held a temporary licence for the rest of the season, sent out Lucyrowe
to finish second in the Cheveley Park Stakes.

Freedman's horses then went to Peter Walwyn at Lambourn, and
the new association made a happy start, for Lucyrowe won the Ebbisham,
Coronation (by 12 lengths), Nassau and Sun Chariot Stakes. In the Nassau
she had just a short head to spare over Seventh Bride, whose successes
included the Princess Royal Stakes.

Two years later, Freedman expanded his interests by purchasing
Beech House Stud and its bloodstock from Lady Sassoon, with the
intention that horses from his Cliveden operation should be handled by
Walwyn and those from Beech House by Noel Murless, who had trained for
the Sassoons.

A few weeks later, Murless sent out his first winner in the
Freedman colours when Abwah took a Newbury maiden. This was the
forerunner of many top-level successes from Warren Place, where Henry
Cecil later trained Reference Point. Abwah proved a smart sprinter,
taking the Duke of York Stakes before going to stud, where he sired
Absalom.

Later in 1971, Freedman had the pleasure of seeing his first
home-bred winner when Guillotina (Busted-Tina), trained by Walwyn, won
the Houghton Stakes at Newmarket. In 1972 she took the Prix de
Royallieu, but one who did even better was Attica Meli (Primera-Come On
Honey), whom he acquired with the Sassoon bloodstock. She won her last
five races that year including the Yorkshire Oaks, Park Hill and
Princess Royal Stakes.

Freedman's increasing prominence in racing resulted in his
appointment as Racehorse Owners' Association president for 1973-74
and election to the Jockey Club in 1975. He served as a steward from
1979 to 1986 and was deputy senior steward in 1981 and 1983.

Freedman gained his first Classic win in 1974, when the home-bred
Polygamy took the Oaks, although she was lucky because Dibidale, who was
third home but was disqualified, was hampered by a slipping saddle.
Dibidale easily gained her revenge in the Irish Oaks.

Polygamy was an early example of Freedman's flair for naming
horses, for she was by Reform out of Seventh Bride.

OTHER fillies who did well for Freedman in 1974 were Mil's
Bomb, who won the Lancashire Oaks, Nassau and Park Hill Stakes, and
Great Guns, who struck six times.

The following year he sold Beech House to concentrate his breeding
interests at Cliveden. That season, Polygamy's full-sister One Over
Parr took the Cheshire and Lancashire Oaks.

In 1977, Royal Hive (Royal Palace-Come On Honey) became the first
good horse trained for Freedman by Henry Cecil, who gradually replaced
Walwyn as his chief trainer. Royal Hive, a half-sister to Attica Meli,
emulated that filly by winning the Park Hill and was also runner-up in
the Yorkshire Oaks and Prix Vermeille.

The next top-level runner to carry Freedman's yellow and black
colours was Home On The Range, who was later dam of Reference Point.
Home On The Range, a daughter of Habitat and Great Guns, included the
1981 Sun Chariot Stakes among her successes.

In the same colours, One Way Street (Habitat-Guillotina) won the
Princess Royal Stakes and Ever Genial (Brigadier Gerard-Shorthouse) the
May Hill Stakes in 1984, and the following year Ever Genial won the
Hungerford Stakes.

Mill On The Floss (Mill Reef-Milly Moss) was placed in the
Ribblesdale Stakes, Lancashire Oaks and Princess Royal Stakes in 1986,
but the high spot of that year was the runaway victory by Reference
Point (Mill Reef- Home On The Range) in the Futurity (now Racing Post
Trophy) at Doncaster, a display which resulted in the colt topping the
Free Handicap.

Freedman had long nursed dreams of having a horse good enough to
win the Triple Crown, and in Reference Point he thought he might have
found him. Cecil, though, sounded caution about trying to get the colt
ready for the 2,000 Guineas over a trip which could well have proved too
sharp for him, and in any case other events took a hand. Reference Point
developed a serious sinus infection in the spring of his three-year-old
days which ruled out the Guineas, and at one stage Cecil was dubious
about the prospects of getting the colt fit for Epsom.

The gloom was dispelled, though, when Reference Point made a
winning comeback in the Dante Stakes before making all in the Derby,
beating Most Welcome by a length and a half.

Reference Point found the year-older Mtoto three-parts of a length
too good in the Eclipse before a repeat of his tenacious front-running
tactics resulted in victory by three lengths and a neck from Celestial
Storm and Triptych in the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes.
Victory at long odds-on in the Great Voltigeur Stakes preceded success
in the St Leger, and though his career ended in defeat in the Prix de
l'Arc de Triomphe-he was eighth to Trempolino-he was later found to
have been suffering from an abscess in a foot.

During Reference Point's racing career, Freedman sold a share
in him to Sheikh Mohammed, and it was to the Sheikh's Dalham Hall
Stud that the son of Mill Reef retired for a short career as a stallion.

Although Reference Point was the jewel in the 1987 Freedman crown,
he was not on his own, as the exploits of others in the same colours
enabled Cliveden to top the breeders' list for the year. Queen
Midas (Glint Of Gold-Star Court) won the Ribblesdale and Shooting Party
landed a good handicap at Ascot.

In 1988, Overdrive (Shirley Heights-Milly Moss) won the Queen
Alexandra Stakes and Reference Point's half-brother Known Ranger
(by Known Fact) took the Bradford & Bingley Handicap.

In April of that year, Freedman transferred the ownership of his
bloodstock to the Cliveden Stud Company and put in charge his younger
son Philip, a merchant banker who was later to become chairman of the
Thoroughbred Breeders' Association.

The first official comment by Freedman senior was that the
operation needed a younger man to run it, but there was more to it than
that. Earlier in the year, an employee of The People newspaper had made
allegations in the paper and on television that Freedman had been party
to an illegal deal with Lester Piggott about the jockey's retainer.

The subsequent rumblings of this affair ended with Piggott being
sent to prison for tax evasion and fraud, but Freedman was so upset by
the allegations that he reduced his public involvement in racing.

His libel case against The People, two of its staff and its then
editor came to court the following year and was settled out of court
after three days. Freedman received undisclosed but
"substantial" damages and costs which amounted to about pounds
300,000; he described himself as "delighted" with the outcome.

In 1990, Freedman won the King Edward VII Stakes with Private
Tender (Shirley Heights-Select Sale) and the Park Hill Stakes (his
fourth victory in the race) and Prix de Royallieu with Madame Dubois
(Legend Of France- Shadywood).

During the 1990s, the Freedmans continued to send horses with fine
pedigrees (and as well named as ever) into training, with Roger Charlton
and US- based Neil Drysdale joining their list of trainers in 1993 and
Julie Cecil dropping out in 1994, but success proved increasingly harder
to achieve.

In 1992 Hatta's Mill (Green Desert-Mill On The Floss) was
second in the Predominate Stakes, and in 1994 Red Route (Polish
Precedent-One Way Street), trained by Cecil, took the Bahrain Trophy and
Geoffrey Freer Stakes. As a result the colt started favourite for the St
Leger but was unplaced.

THE same year, Milly Ha Ha (Dancing Brave-Mill On The Floss) was
fourth in the Yorkshire Oaks and third in the Princess Royal Stakes.

Freedman gained immense pleasure in 1996 when his son Philip, who
had been chairman of the TBA council, joined him as a member of the
Jockey Club, but once again the racing year for Cliveden was a low-key
affair, though Dacha won the Cecil Frail Handicap at Haydock.

In the last two seasons, the best horse to carry the Freedman silks
was Daggers Drawn, a grandson of Shadywood. He won three out of four in
1997, including the July and Richmond Stakes, and was one of
Europe's leading juveniles, though his Classic season this year was
disappointing.

Freedman is survived by his three children Clive, Philip and
Maralyn.

GEORGE ENNOR

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